Personal Independence Payments

James Morris Excerpts

Tuesday 28th February 2017 Commons Chamber

[Damian Green]

They will both be entitled to PIP at the level that will be assessed. Each individual is different and has different levels of difficulty. It is often the case that for people who are blind, with visual or cognitive impairments, they will not have a fluctuating condition. It will clearly be less amenable to treatment than some other conditions. It is the level of difficulty in a person’s daily life, whether they have a physical or a mental health problem, that matters in terms of the PIP assessment.

[James Morris (Halesowen and Rowley Regis) (Con)]

The Secretary of State will be aware that since joining this place I have been a strong campaigner for parity of esteem between mental and physical health. Is not one of the key points he is making that this is not a binary decision between mental and physical health? The point of PIP is that it promotes targeted help for people with mental health conditions. Is it not also the case that more people are receiving payments under PIP for mental health conditions than ever was the case under DLA?

[Damian Green]

I pay tribute to my hon. Friend for the very good work he has done in his time in the House on mental health. He is absolutely right. A core tenet of PIP’s design is the principle of equivalence between physical and non-physical conditions. The whole House ought to welcome this move. It is why, as he has explained, it is a better benefit than DLA. Rolling PIP out in this way and attempting to improve the assessment process in the way we are is the best way for us to help people with all kinds of disabilities, specifically those with mental health conditions.